NEWSY NOTES FROM HERE AND THERE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1352, 27 January 1898, Page 9

NEWSY NOTES FROM HERE AND THERE.

"The writer o0»:;AlonJ"She Line/*'in tb e the following frioim * Ififcif-back which pretty well explains the situation f~ " We have no fats, as we have ibnly had Bin of rain during the last two *years, J am prepared to do an extensive lirie in extract of meat, as the drought has reduced the most of this herd to that don* dition, buyers to do the pumping and bottling themselves. I was much disappointed by the Land Commission not coming nearer than 300 miles. I was hoping to give them a meat extract lunch, and get a testimonial" from them before they died." '/ %

A soldier has written to Truth asking the proper way for a soldier to act. on being addressed by a lady. It often happens (he.says) that a lady bids one ithe ti*ne ; of day when passing. This has -happened to me. Were Ifoa civilian I should raise rny hat, but as a soldier I cannot. To salute does not appear to me to be correct, and to simply reply " Good morning " appears too'cool. Truth suggests a graoeful bow, waving a handkerchief, or blowing a kiss. '.'-J

Enterprising goldseekers are Messrs Clark and Penny, of 'Minneapolis, Who expect to go to Alaska next spring. "They \ifere in the city " (the Philadelphia Ledger says) "looking after machinery for a boat tbey expect to build at Portland, Oregon.: l| will be built the coming winter, and will lie ready for transportation to Alaska by Ist March, when the owners expect to leave for the goldfields of that distant country. Their boat will be 100 ft Kin length, 20ft wide, and 7ft deep* When the Yukon is reached, the boat will be fitted wjth machinery and a miner's outfit, and] stores will be taken on board. After going up the Yukon a few hundred miles prospecting will begin, Jmt not With thel ordinary miner's tools. These gentlemen have devised a new idea. Their boat will be fitted out with oentrifugal pumps of great power, and the sands on the bottom of the river will be ' panned '

from the bow of the boat. They are

satisfied that much gold can be got put of p the river in this manner, and will be jpight on hand to D6gin work early." "" *

While ifctaiU of ttie Australian cricketers* ■ays TTodmeVa, were being shav«d ; in a Sydney days; ago, a pattered military jderelict—one of the kind who has seen better days-—came in, and.qqin-, ing in the conversation on cricket, Said, "I believe Ranji is a Cambridge man. I'm a Cains College man myself. Oh, I have played in Fenner's Field, I tell you."" "You would be pretty, good on a wet? pitch, sir," observed tbeharte "Oh, yais," said thV J w^eci, <i 'l;Wasn't bad." "Field : a slips, sir ?" the barbeir ofdierttd. Thercricketers were getting interested in the matter when the man from Caius College gave himself away helplessly. " OK,' I could'field anywhere/' he. asserted; " anywhere the umpire pulte^

ordinary run of fell stories .is acceptablle. Here it is, Victorian leaving iwfiCoatok thelhlmtof 44 ■• stream; failed to findit agajn^J j^m?* [ n siW^ ol ! B cow takes-ill imdT'dies. , : \ Coat.found, in cow's sifcomacnV" r Coat ; , washed out and ironed, is now being worn by the owner. This is called a fish story by the narrator. It certainly has a remote, connection: with fish, and, as premised, is a.variation from the monotony of the big-fish yarn.

In cap

tured with her unarmed ciuiafifs the Chinese battle ship Chen Yuen, 7409 tons,

and the Ping Yuen, an armoured coast defence ship; and to these she has already added five sea going vessels of 32,000 tons total displacement, including the two first class English built battle ships Fuji and the Yashima, of 12,800 tons each. When the present programme is completed Japan will have a total effective force of 67 sea-going ships, 12 torpedo catchers, and 75 torpedo boats, with an aggregate displacement of 200,000 tons. At the end of the Chinese war, which seems only the other day, Japan had a total displacement (leaving out Chines prizes) of 64,000 tons. In view of this, Mr Cramp, an American ship builder, asks whether Russia and the United States are prepared or are preparing to meet such conditions and to " maintain their proper, naval status," and he answers in the negative;" Irt the race for naval supremacy in the Pacific, Japan |l f awing, wbUe Bw«* and the Wted

' States are losing ground." In three years ' Japan will be able to dominate the Pacific J against either of those powers, and in less ' than 10 years against both! r

An, arousing story is told of one of tin Italian prisoners recently sent back from Abyssinia. He was wounded at Adowa, where Menelik's men plundered the Italian camp-chest. Having no use for Italian bank-notes as money, and believing that the engraving on them bad magical power, the plastered the prisoner's wounds with notes to the value of nearly £IOOO. He was arrested on his return to Italy, but a court-martial set him free and decided that he might retain the money.

Mr Ernest Benson, the one-tim<- " Jubilee Plunger," is living in Jersey. He cannot touch the large sum of money which has been left him, except in onf way, namely, by drawing his regnlai limited allowance of some few hundred a year. So he jogs along very quietly He may be seen any day strolling alcny the main thoroughfares of the clean town of St. Heliers. He still takes a keen interest in betting, and follows the doing* of the English racing world with more than ordinary zest, although his present financial position does not allow of hi." making any very astonishing " r lunges."

It is almost impossible to judge the size of an object which is'fifty feet or more in the air above the observer. Everybody who has been in London knows how deceptive is the appearance of the famous clock "Big Ben" over the Houses of Parliament. Looking at, the dial from the Enbankment or from Great George Street, it seems as if a man of medium size could easily stretch across the dud with both arms. Yet it would take four pairs of outstretched arms to cross it. The minuts hand, which looks like an ordinary walking stick, is longer than the height of two average men. The figures on the dial are bigger than a child three years old. Equally deceptive are the funnels of the Atlantic steamers. The funnels of the Umbria and Etruria are eighteen feet in diameter, while those of the Lucania and Campania are just twenty-one feet across. Each funnel from the top to its junction with the furnace is one hundred, and thirty feet in length.

An American visitor to England, Dr Gage, says :-r-v As one of a self-appointed committee of two, designated to the agreeable task of reporting as to the probability from internal evidence of the Isle of Wight being the sight of the original Eden, I am prepared to give an affirmative answer. AH England is beautiful, save that dreadful part given over to mine 3 and to factories, which has received the appropriate designation of the Black Country. But after an inspection of England which has embraced even somt of the loveliest scenery of Wales; after seeing the beauties of Derbyshire, including Matlock, of which Hawthorne says that he thinks it, must be the loveliest place in all the:'world.; after viewing the beauty Of the Wye, with Ross and Tintern Abbeyincluded'; after spending a month by the English Lakes,.'by the sides 'of Windermere,., and Grasmere; after the lovely Hills and valleys of Hampshire, and Shropshire; even ifte^ tt jfalvlln ii 4ha L 4ts famous hills, I must say that the Isle of Wight sums them all up and then eclipses ;them all. For what is thereof beauty in the world that is not .there ? I do not fsay of grandeur or of sublimity; I say of beauty ; and yet there is also the touch of nobleness in its hills and cliff's at<d far-off |ocean sublimities to make it even inspiring. Certainly the word beauty does not com- > prise all that it offers."— Rand and Heart.

\ According to a contemporary, a wealthy ironmaster in the North of England, Whose house and works are dazzlingly illuminated by the electric light, has adopted an ingenious contrivance, by which he may glean some information as to to what goes on during his not infre quent. absences from home. In several of his rooms and in his offices there is a concealed apparatus in the walls, consisting of a roll of Eastern paper and a train of clockwork. Every hour a is silently opened by the machinery, and an instantaneous photograph is taken of nil that 'is going on in the room. On the great man's return he likes to develop these pictures, and it is said they have furnished some very strange information indeed. One clerk, who received his dismissal somewhat unexpectedly, and boldly wanted to know the reason why, was horrified when shown a in which he was depicted lolling in aifc easy chair, with his feet upon the office desk, wfojje tye cJoqJj on, tfce mantelpiece pointed

to an hour at which he ought to have been at his busiest. The servants' party in the best dining room furnished another thrilling scene.

In the current Cornhill Magazine a writer tells how he came across old John, the hedge cutter, preparing to abandon work on a recent Saturday, but eventually intending, to leave the clippings haphazard on the roadway. " Why, John," he said, " don't you call it'a. bit unsportsmanlike to spoil other folk's pleasure '? " " Well, sir," said John, " I be just leaving these for they Sabbath-breakers."

Some time ago the Prince of Wales was driving through a little town to lay the foundation stone of a building, when suddenly, without any aisiiju-ible reason, EI.R.H was seen bj the members of his suite to shake his sidi-s mid break into loud shouts of laughter. One of the Gentlemen of Waiting happnned to raise his eyes and begun to follow the" prince's example, and the next minute the whole party went into cum unions. This is what happened. A wearing a top hat of prodigious dimensions had just emerged from a chimney; catching sight of the Prince, and i6'*embfiing his military code, he stood perchv»d tip there like a sentry at his post and presented arms with his brush. • '■',-■' '•",'.

The lady with marriageable/daughters, whom she wishes to see sealed in life, may get an idea from the following paragraph. It is from the pen/of a cynical young man who writes in The Temple Magazine. Speaking of the way younsr men.become engaged to be married, he says i-frj-t generally happens something like this. A young man meets a girl at a church, a bazaar, or a pociol gathering; he sees'her home, meets her "again, is introduced to her mother, invited tO tea, then to spend the evening, then to Spend Sunday. The girl is pretty, and possesses certain winning little ways that are very attractive. He soon notices that he is left alone with the girl a good deal, and is apparently expected to sit with her at lectures, concerts, and sometimes in church itself. He ma;> be a fool, but he is not blind, and it is soon borne in upon him that the girl is very fond of him, and that her people expect him to marry her. So far he has had no thought of matrix raony-—only of, pleasant and''innocent comradeship. The idea of spending half a century in her company is not altogether exhilarating, and he knows that she, is perfectly incapable of managing a household.'. But he is as chivalrous as he is eommonplace, and he will not make the girl unhappy, or allow her people to think of him as a cad. 8o he " lets things slide," engages "hirnself to the girl, and duly marries her—reluctantly.

Some homely anecdote? are related in the biography of the Rev Solßmpn Cassar Malan, parson, : traveller v . and scholar. It is written by his son and published fey John Murray. On one occasion, after ministering to a sick man, he sat talking to the wife on some interesting topic of village news. The husband, catching a word here and there, turned himself about and feebly tried to sit up that he might ;hear more. But the wife sharply rebuked him with the woidsi—"Whit he 'bout, ; Will'm ? What's it got to do With you ? Get on with your dying 1" In the course of a summer holiday at Tenby, Dr and Mrs Malan were taking an evening walk upon the promenade, when Mrs Malan became aware that they were the cynosure of all eyes. Presently a gentleman came up, and, with deferential gestures, taking off his hat, he said: " Pardon me for the liberty, sir, but w.e are anxious to know if we have the honour to be in the presence of Mr Gladstone?" "No—thank God ! " waa the prompt reply. " | teg your paid.n, eh." " So"y'oja ought to I " "- x •

When he was twelve Rudyard Kipling went on a sea voyage with Mr Lockwood Kipling, his father. Unfortunately, the elder Kipling became very sea sick, and went below, leaving the youngster to himself. Presently there was a great commotion overhead, and one of the officers rushed down and banged at Mr Kipling's door. "Mr Kipling,'' he cried, " your boy has crawled out on the yardarmsj and if he let's go* he'll drown." "Yes," said Mr Kipling, glad to know that nothing serious was he won't let go."

The centre of felicity is not in the brain; it is in the vital nervous system, and in the cavities of the body itself, near the stomach or heart. Felicity Is favoured by sufficiency of rest and sleep. Whatever

prevents physical exhaustion and sustains physical strength sustains felicity. The one million rich shut up our 25 millions under bad conditions, and wonder why they know nothing of felicity,•! why they are peevish, melancholy, sometimes drunken. Wonder ! The wonder is how human nature can bear such a famine of felicity and live; as if it only lived to die. Sir B. W. Bichardson.

At the funeral of Colonel Chard, V. 0., the hero of Borke's Drift, there was a very large number of wreaths and Grosses, including a large wreath of bay leaves tied with satin streamers from the Queen. Attached to it was the inscription : —" A mark of admiration and regard for a brave soldier from his Sovereign.—Victoria B.I." The Bev. C. E Chard, rector of Hatch Beauchamp, and brother of the deceased, also received from her Majesty a sympa thetic private letter.

The first Governor of New South Wales expressed the opinion, in 1788: —"This country will never answer to settle in, for though I think corn will grow here, yet I am convinced that, if ever it is able to maintain the people sent here, it Cannot in less time than a hundred years luence. In the whole world there is not a worse country than that we have yet seen." Yet only a hvndred years after this gloomy forecast the products of Australaiaa were valued at £115,000,000 in a single year.

Mr William Packenham Walsh, who retired the other day from the See of Ossory,/when a young curate, just Sl.years ago, baptised Mr Parnell. He was subsequently Mr Parnell's tutor. The bishop met Mr Parnell in after years in the lobby of the House of Commons, and referred to those early days when Mr Parnell was his pupil. " Come into the House, my Lord Bishop," said Mr Parnell gravely, "and see how I have improved on the les3ons you taught me. Come and watch me instructing my own pupils.',

" Wbomeia," in the Australasian, says they are telling a story in Sydney at the expense 1 of the local king of the ring, which shows, first, the extreme readiness of a swindler, and the ease with which even the boost worl ily come to grief. The big bookmaker was travelling into the city by tram, when he dropped his hand to his watch-pbeket, and said, *« What a fool I am. I've put my watch under my pillow, and Comd avray without it." On arriving at his office, he sent one of his clerks out to get the watch, but he was not quick enough. An enterprising man travelling by that tram had dropped off at the next corner, gone, straight to the bookmaker's residence, and said to his wife, "Mr O sent me out for and chain. He says you will find them under his pillow, as he forgot them this morning/' With such corroborative, detail, who could doubt the genuineness of the messenger; ? The wat6h and Chain—both Very, valuablewere handed over, and the owner hasn't seen them since.

Brisbane possesses a weekly journal called The Streeti.. which thus discourses on a local M.L.A.:—"He has the intelligence of a 'bus proprietor; and, when he chooses, the manners of a bear. .Thie Street is open to bet that he does not read sis decent books in any average six months and could not speak intelligently for sfi minutes on any principle of civic management. He is the very type of your small-minded, hide-bound, pigheaded, out-of-date Fat Man/' Then the?, writer hurries on to another man and remarks:—" The Street understands that Mr Blank is shortly coming: to Brisbane. Mr Blank is an unparalleled scoundrel; and if he does come, tbis gentle paper will write him such a puff biographical as shall move him to the depths. The Street loves unutterable cads who go round the world under a score of aliasas and live on the trifles thoy feloniously pilfer from decent people.

Curious advertisement from the Mangaweka Settler :—NOTlCE.—White Star Line of CoAo«ES,-r*The Owner desires to notify that after; battling through the winter he has received, on the first day of summer, one week's notice to leave the stables, and consequently the " White Star Coach " will make her last trip under the present Management on Monday night. The Proprietor wishes to thank those residents who have so loyally supported him during the eight months the Opposition were trying to crawl into his stables; and leaves the public to decide whether their interests are best served by having "only one" coaoh running to " only one houser" In justice to Mr^—-, the Proprietor of the Line desires to state j that Mr. mz ft $9 Wfjrely f>so»eflrtsfl I

from the serious charge of having stolen a Grey Cat from the Hotel, as the valuable feline turned up about two hours after Mr had started for Kaikoura. Neither Mr —— or his boss bear the Grey Cat any ill-will, and they both trust that she may long be permitted to shriek at the midnight moon undisturbed by the actions of any unprincipled adventurer. Ohingaiti, November 9, 1897.

"On all sides," says Lord Salisbury, " the instruments of destruction are piling up, armies becoming larger, the powers who concentrate them become greater, and each nation.is bound, for its own safety, to take part in this competition."

G. W. Stevens, in a London Daily Mail article, entitled " Under the Iron Heel," thus describes Kaiser Wilhelm as seen recently in Berlin :—" A man of middle size, sitting constrainedly and bolt upright, a dead yellow skin, hard pencilled brows, a straight, masterful nose, lips jammed together under a dark moustache, pointing dtraight upward to the whites of his eyes; a face at once repulsive and pathetic, so harsh and stony was it, so grimly solemn ; a face in which no individual feature was very dark, but which altogether was black as thunder. He raised his gloved hand in a stiff, mechanical salute, and turned his head impassively from left to right, but there was no courtesy in the salute, no light in the eye, no smile on the tight mouth for his loyal subjects. He looked like a man without joy, without love, without pity, without hope. He looked like a man who had never laughed, like a man who could never sleep. A man might wear such a face who felt himself turning slowly into ice.

At Boston, United States, recently, the Bev George Bader, assisted by a boy choir, publicly married Charlotte Wiberg and Arthur Standrassy in a den of lions at the Zoological Gardens. The clergy, man seems to have been somewhat furtively watchful of the movements of the lions; but the bride and bridegroom appeared to be less frightened than the lions, Caesar and Cleopatra.

In order, probably, to impress the ountry with the gravity of the rabbit plague in the festive Bulloo land, the Thargomindah (Queensland) Herald, in its; latest issue to hand, has the following pax :—■" Curried rabbit, baked rabbit, and bunny cooked in every shape and manner is frequently on the bill of fare of the logal hotels, and, notwithstanding the chicken cholera experiments in the district, the dish is evidently relished. Birdnesting and shanghai-shooting have lost their charm for the sportive schoolboy, who, when 4 o'clock arrives, crosses the river and hunts the long-eared rodent, [ eturning in or so with four or |fivemeok-eyed.victims. In the immediate viojnity of the town rabbits are more than ever, and up the river at Soonali piay are,even more peniiful. It has been suggested that whe-n vve are next visitef'by .a 'Minister, or ;some other representative politicLiit, a grand fcuriDy hunt should be arranged Mi i BodpSHa, for a snap-shot sketch of a -portly ,lrgisUator wildly careering after one of jibe peaitr 6Ver the 'gibbers'' that stud the su-face jof fchji jmn*baked Bttfloo country uiif!si ! Imprsaj on the metropolitan Pr*-V »w! I the Queensland Parliament the fnct that rabbjta exist in large nun bers hi Lkis district," ■

A cannon without smoke; flame I I* seems impossible, in *'n i •., . 1 Humbert, of the French Army, 'j&.iikjj not. By closing the mouth of iiw- gun automatically after the bullet m U :'s ho would suppress not merely th« sun lie at:d flame, but the detonation oaUsVd by ihd sudden rush of air into the arm. Moreoi'or, the recoil would be reduced in consequence. He has partially succeeded in doing this by fixing on the muzzile of the gun a metal piece, which carries a shutler worked automatically by the escaping fumes in such a manner as to close the mouth of the barrel as soon as the bullet escapes from it.